Project ExCELL: SEDL and the TEA are Partners in Setting Language Education Standards
¿Habla Ud. español? Parlez-vous français? Sprechen sie Deutsch? Loqueris linguam Latinam?
More Texas public school students should soon be able to answer these questions with "Sí," "Oui," "Ja," and "Ita." Their enhanced proficiency in languages other than English will result from a statewide initiative in language education by the Texas Education Agency (TEA), in which staff at the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL) in Austin will play an instrumental role.
In January SEDL received funding for Project ExCELL, known also as Excellence and Challenge: Expectations for Language Learners. The $316,505 subcontract was provided by the TEA through the U.S. Department of Education Secretary's Fund for Innovation in Education. This is the first of three anticipated annual awards earmarked for Project ExCELL.
"An important goal of the project is to strengthen and enhance the capabilities of Texas teachers of non-English languages," Mace-Matluck said. "The project will result in a common set of standards that can inform language curriculum, assessment, teacher preparation, and professional development."
Project ExCELL staff will work in close collaboration with language education staff at the TEA. All plans and decisions will be made cooperatively, with final decision-making authority resting with TEA project directors, Inés García and Carl Johnson.
"We are delighted and honored that we were selected to receive this award," said Dr. Betty Mace-Matluck, Project ExCELL's budget authority and SEDL vice president, Center for Language Minority Population Projects. "It will enable us to work with Texas educators to develop content standards for language instruction and student performance."
During the study's first year, SEDL staff will manage the development of content and performance standards for Texas K-12 public school students studying languages other than English. Project ExCELL's focus during the second year will shift from students to teachers, when Texas educators will prepare guidelines for teacher education and professional development. In the project's third and final year, the content and performance standards and professional training guidelines developed earlier will be used to develop and test model programs.
"An important goal of the project is to strengthen and enhance the capabilities of Texas teachers of non-English languages," Mace-Matluck said. "The project will result in a common set of standards that can inform language curriculum, assessment, teacher preparation, and professional development."
By implementing course content and performance standards based on the newest research findings, the project will expose Texas students to the forefront of innovative language instruction, Mace-Matluck said.
Among the leaders in the national movement to implement standards in the language curriculum is Robert LaBouve, a member of SEDL's Project ExCELL team. A former director of the Languages Unit at the TEA, LaBouve will oversee the writing and editing of the Texas content and performance standards.
The improvements in language education resulting from the revised standards will help Texas students later, when they compete in the global economy, LaBouve said.
"Plus, language study is good, basic education," he said. "What do you want students to learn in school? One of the most important things is language and the use of language. With a second language they learn how language functions and how cultures interact.
"By emphasizing content standards for grade K-12, this program ensures that every child will get this opportunity. And, by emphasizing performance, it assumes that every child can meet these standards in language proficiency," LaBouve added.
The Texas study will concentrate on the traditional languages taught to K-12 students who are native English speakers, said Jim C. Currin, Project ExCELL's Senior Development Associate.
"These languages include Spanish, French, German, and Latin, as well as the less commonly taught languages such as Japanese, Russian, Arabic, and Portuguese. But our Texas emphasis also invites us to design curricula in Spanish language study for Spanish native speakers who want to build their Spanish skills," Currin said.
Other SEDL staff contributing to Project ExCELL are Dr. María Lissi, a specialist in evaluation and curriculum design, who will develop Project ExCELL's surveys and other research tools, and Senior Secretary Kelley Muehlhausen.
As a result of nominations from classroom educators, university researchers, foreign language specialists, and members of the Texas State Board of Education, a 22-member writing team has been named. During the next year, that team, working with the SEDL staff, will draft the content and performance standards.
Local teachers, college professors, school administrators, parents, community activists, and business people will be invited to comment on drafts of the standards documents, and their ideas will be merged with knowledge culled from national and regional experts. The writing team will consider all these sources while refining the standards into a final version.
SEDL brings to Project ExCELL more than 29 years of experience in developing products and programs focused on language education, especially for students with non-English language backgrounds. For more information on Project ExCELL, contact Dr. Betty Mace-Matluck or Jim C. Currin at the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory, Austin, at 512/476-6861, ext. 244.
Next Article: Resources for School Safety
